Circular B21-2006



Bloomington Faculty Council - Educational Policies Committee
General Education Requirements
for Baccalaureate Degrees
at Indiana University Bloomington

December 1, 2005






The Constitution of the Indiana University Faculty assigns to School Faculties the primary legislative authority over curriculum and the conferring of degrees for their Schools. 1 Respecting this principle, this document establishes norms that School Faculties should follow and implement in the requirements for their baccalaureate degrees. School Faculties may depart from these norms for such reasons as certification and licensing requirements; however, all departures should be reviewed and discussed periodically with the Bloomington Faculty Council and Bloomington Academic Officers. If disagreements should persist, then the Bloomington Faculty Council has the authority under the Constitution to determine how the authority of the Bloomington Faculty shall be exercised. 2





The Nature of General Education for Undergraduates


An undergraduate college education should broaden, enhance, and strengthen a person's knowledge, intellectual capabilities, and understanding. The undergraduate student must grow from an epistemology and ethics based on authority to one based on an autonomous, reasoned evaluation of assertions and evidence. A holder of a baccalaureate degree should be able to analyze critically the surrounding world and to articulate that analysis coherently to others. The holder should be able to draw upon a broad understanding of multiple disciplines in order to participate fully in contemporary society.
To this end, an Indiana University undergraduate education should provide a sound foundation in written and verbal communication, qualitative and quantitative analysis and reasoning, and literacy in information resources; a solid breadth of knowledge, intellectual capabilities, and understanding; opportunities for educational engagement with the local and global community; and significant strength in at least one discipline or one interdisciplinary area.
General education encompasses the first and second of these: a sound foundation in written and verbal communication, qualitative and quantitative analysis and reasoning, and literacy in information resources; and a solid breadth of knowledge, intellectual capabilities, and understanding. General education is a part of a liberal arts education, but the latter - as exemplified by the BA degree offered by the College of Arts and Sciences - aims for greater, and more solid, breadth than the former. General education may be thought of as being that portion of a liberal arts education that develops intellectual capabilities and knowledge across disciplines and that should be a part of every baccalaureate degree offered by Indiana University.
The April, 2004, A Report on the Harvard College Curricular Review (Harvard University, Faculty of Arts and Sciences) in its section on "General Education" (page 11) noted that
"Different institutions have defined general education in different ways. Some stress coverage of specific knowledge that every educated person should have, while others emphasize development of skills that are essential to the acquisition, communication, and generation of knowledge."
The report goes on to observe that each of these approaches has merit and they are not incompatible.
Indeed, these two approaches are complementary dimensions of general education both of which are essential to an Indiana University undergraduate education. In the knowledge dimension, a student must learn a broad base of foundational knowledge in the liberal arts and sciences. In the intellectual capabilities dimension, a student must learn communication, quantitative, analytical, and reasoning skills spanning the range of deductive, empirical, and aesthetic methodologies. Only then can the student bring to bear relevant knowledge and analytical skills to analyze and understand complex situations and cogently communicate that understanding to others.
Undergraduate education at Indiana University has long been characterized by its strength and commitment to the arts, humanities, foreign languages and diverse indigenous and international cultures, and the empirical sciences - including the social sciences, physical and life sciences, managerial sciences, and educational sciences. What is distinctive about the general education model outlined below is the emphasis on international studies and the sciences. An Indiana University degree ought to be responsive to the two great educational demands of the twenty-first century, namely, the need for a global perspective in all fields of learning and the need among the state, national, and global citizenry for the capacity to evaluate the technical, political, social, and ethical implications of scientific knowledge and to distinguish between dogma and empirically tested scientific knowledge.
Traditionally, general education requirements have been formulated along the knowledge dimension in terms of fundamental skill requirements and the long recognized disciplinary groupings of arts and humanities, social sciences, and natural and life sciences, as in the Bloomington campus' 1981 ``General Education Requirements for the Baccalaureate Degree'' , in which students are required to take several courses in each group.
Some IU campuses that have formulated policies more recently than Bloomington have retained the traditional groupings but given them more descriptive names, as in the Fort Wayne campus' "The Individual, Culture, and Society" and "Humanistic Thought" groups, and have added new groupings, as in the Southeast campus' "Critical Thinking" and "Diversity" groups.
The South Bend campus is currently engaged in carrying this evolution to its natural end of identifying thematic areas with a requirement of one course in each thematic area: "Literary and Intellectual Traditions", "Human Behavior and Social Institutions", "The Natural World", "Art, Aesthetics, and Creativity", "Diversity in American Society", "Non-Western Cultures", and "Health and Wellness".
All of these approaches define general education in terms of the knowledge dimension, although some are more so, e.g., Bloomington's approach, while others are less so, e.g., Southeast's approach which specifies intellectual "outcomes" criteria for determining which courses qualify for inclusion in its new groupings.
The Indianapolis campus, on other hand, in its ``Principles of Undergraduate Learning'' , has defined its requirements for undergraduate education entirely along the intellectual capabilities dimension. Its students are expected to acquire the intellectual skills identified in the "Principles of Undergraduate Learning" over the whole of their undergraduate career. The Indianapolis faculty are currently engaged in defining what levels of these capabilities should be acquired and demonstrated during the first year, during the middle years, and during the final year.
Of the "Principles of Undergraduate Learning," the ones that are integral to the general education of beginning undergraduate students are (1) "Core Communication and Quantitative Skills"; (2) the first steps toward "Critical Thinking"; (3) the "Breadth" portion of "Intellectual Depth, Breadth, and Adaptiveness"; (4) much of "Understanding Society and Culture"; and (5) aesthetic judgment and the University's core value of academic integrity in "Values and Ethics."





The Bloomington Context
  1. Bloomington Faculty Council resolution of 1981. 3
    The Bloomington Faculty Council adopted a policy on general education requirements for all baccalaureate degrees instituted after the date of its adoption. The requirement was that all such degrees should include a general education requirement that each student take at least forty degree hours, outside the student's major, distributed among the following areas with at least nine hours in each of these areas:
    1. Life and physical sciences
    2. Social sciences, and
    3. Humanities.
    However, this policy has not been followed. Furthermore, it does not apply to degrees instituted prior its adoption.
  2. Recent efforts
    1. The Gray Committee Report and the Proposal for the Reform of the Freshman Year (1998-99)
      In January, 1998, a committee of senior faculty members appointed by Chancellor Gros Louis and chaired by Professor Don Gray submitted its report "Undergraduate Education in Bloomington - A Report to the Chancellor." This report discussed what "graduates of baccalaureate programs in Bloomington should know and be able to do" (abilities, knowledge, and values), how well these purposes were being accomplished, and what steps should be taken. Among its recommendations was a call for the creation of a committee to study the first two years of undergraduate education at Bloomington.
      The Chancellor appointed such a committee, which submitted its recommendations during the summer of 1998. From these recommendations and those of the Gray Committee, Chancellor Gros Louis submitted to the campus faculty, via the Bloomington Faculty Council, a "Proposal on General Education", that subsequently was referred to as the "Proposal for the Reform of the Freshman Year." Two of the items in this proposal - Freshman Seminars and a course on the Traditions and Culture of Indiana University were implemented. However, other proposal on Approaches to Learning and Learning in Teams did not find favor and were not implemented.
    2. The Unified Distribution Requirement effort (1999-2000)
      The Campus Curriculum Committee, decided to take the multidisciplinary aspects of the Proposal on General Education, which had not been implemented, and recast them as a campus-wide distribution requirement. The plan was "... an attempt to build consensus campuswide distribution-requirement course menus by pooling about 20 hours of each school's G. E. requirements." 4 This proposal had strong supporters, but it failed because of certification and licensing requirements, especially in HPER and Education, and because of opposition from the School of Business, which viewed the proposal from the Campus Curriculum Committee as an "administrative invasion of faculty prerogatives." 5
    3. Common Undergraduate General Education Requirements (COUGER) (2000-01)
      The next year, the Campus Curriculum Committee proposed a reduced version of its Unified Distribution Requirement. The reduced version - the proposal for "Common Undergraduate General Education Requirements" - called for each school to revise its general education requirement to require at least 20 credits in general education, consisting of 2-3 credits in written communication, 3 credits in finite mathematics or calculus, 3-9 credits in the arts and humanities, 3-9 credits in social and historical studies, and 3-9 credits in the natural and mathematical sciences (the latter to be above the 3 credits in finite mathematics or calculus). Courses could be offered by any school, and courses appearing on a campus-wide list of approved courses for each category would have to be accepted by each school as meeting its degree requirements. The College would be authorized to determine which of its courses satisfied each category. However, the Campus Curriculum Committee would manage the list of courses from outside COAS.
      This proposal failed because of opposition from the College that it would be forced to accept courses for its degree requirements that it had not approved. This infringed on the authority of the faculty of each school to determine the requirements for its degrees.
  3. Recommendation from the Strategic Planning Committee (2003)
    The campus' Strategic Planning Committee, in its May 12, 2003, report on "General Priorities: Strategic Needs and Opportunities", said:
    1.4. There also appears to be a need for more clarity and structure in the curricula across the campus, and for clearer relationships among those curricula and between them and coursework at other IU campuses and other Indiana educational institutions. Attention to these important issues should include:
           1.4.1. Articulation of common requirements that all students should have met, or minimum competencies that all students should be able to demonstrate, prior to graduation.
           1.4.2. Renewed consideration of general education requirements. At a minimum, the campus should standardize how the main distribution areas are designated and specify what courses count for each in a way that can be used by every school.
           1.4.3. A sound, consistent, and predictable basis for accepting course credit from other campuses and Indiana colleges and universities.
  4. The 2003 Task Force on Undergraduate Education and the Report from University Division
    Chancellor Brehm and Vice Chancellor Moya Andrews, during the summer of 2003, convened a Task Force on Undergraduate Education. Dean Sally Dunn (University Division) submitted a proposal on and an analysis of general education requirements for the primary baccalaureate degrees of the schools on the Bloomington campus. The proposal encouraged the schools to try reach agreement on what courses would satisfy the English composition requirement, what the names should be for the three primary distribution areas (i.e., arts and humanities, social sciences, and natural and mathematical sciences), and what courses would satisfy distribution requirements in these distribution areas.
  5. IUPUI policies and multi-campus schools (1998)
    In May of 1998, the IUPUI Faculty Council adopted a proposal on "Principles of Undergraduate Learning." ( http://www.jaguars.iupui.edu/gened/gnedprin.html This proposal identifies six areas in which baccalaureate graduates should have intellectual competence and cultural and ethical awareness: (1) core communication and quantitative skills; (2) critical thinking; (3) integration and application of knowledge; (4) intellectual depth, breadth, and adaptiveness; (5) understanding society and culture; and (6) values and ethics. Each school that has programs on the IUPUI campus, including multi-campus and system schools such as Business, Education, and Informatics, is required to identify how their courses teach these principles and how competence related to each principle will be learned and assessed.
    These principles are not a general education requirement per se; rather they are principles by which each school must design its general education requirements.
  6. President Herbert's call for an Indiana University, system-wide, general education curriculum that "serves as the defining characteristic of the IU undergraduate experience."
  7. Harvard's reform of its undergraduate curriculum (2004)
    In 2004 Harvard released a review of its undergraduate curriculum.6 The main recommendations were to replace its then current system of general education (the Core Program) with a new system of general education with courses that "... expand the horizons of both faculty and students; introduce bodies of knowledge, concepts, and major texts; develop and reinforce critical skills in reasoning and in written and oral expression; ...." Students should be able to fulfill their general education requirements through courses selected "... within large areas of knowledge." The areas might build on Harvard's current divisional structure - humanities, social sciences, life sciences, and physical sciences. Most importantly, every student should be required to complete an international experience abroad, and every student "... should be educated in the sciences in a manner that is as deep and broadly shared, as has traditionally been the case in the humanities and the social sciences."
  8. Statement on General Education from the Higher Learning Commisssion of the North Central Association (2003)
    Understanding and appreciating diverse cultures, mastering multiple modes of inquiry, effectively analyzing and communicating information, and recognizing the importance of creativity and values to the human spirit not only allow people to live richer lives but also are a foundation for most careers and for the informed exercise of local, national, and international citizenship. The Commission expects organizations of higher learning to address these important ends, and has embedded this expectation in its Criteria for Accreditation.
    Throughout its history, the Commission has believed that quality undergraduate higher education involves breadth as well as depth of study. As understood by the Commission, general education is intended to impart common knowledge and intellectual concepts to students and to develop in them the skills and attitudes that an organization's faculty believe every educated person should possess. From an organization's general education, a student acquires a breadth of knowledge in the areas and proficiency in the skills that the organization identifies as hallmarks of being college educated. Moreover, effective general education helps students gain competence in the exercise of independent intellectual inquiry and also stimulates their examination and understanding of personal, social, and civic values.
    Effective general education can be shaped to fit unique organizational contexts. As higher education changes, so too do the ways in which organizations create and provide general education. General education must be valued and owned by the organization whether its courses are created, purchased, or shared; whether faculty are full-time, part-time, or employed by a partner organization; and whether the organization creates general education opportunities primarily through curriculum or relies heavily on experiential and off-campus opportunities to achieve its learning goals for general education.
    Regardless of how a higher learning organization frames the general education necessary to fulfill its mission and goals, it clearly and publicly articulates the purposes, content, and intended learning outcomes of the general education it provides for its students. It also shows its commitment to the centrality of general education by including an appropriate component of general education in all undergraduate programs of substantial length, whether they lead to certificates, diplomas, or degrees. Moreover, the organization's faculty exercises oversight for general education and, working with the administration, regularly assesses its effectiveness against the organization's stated goals for student learning.





Indiana University Bloomington Baccalaureate Degrees,
General Education Components of


At this time in the Campus' life, the purpose of stating a minimal general education requirement for baccalaureate degrees is to affirm the importance of both the knowledge dimension and the intellectual capabilities dimension of general education and to unite them in a shared, distinctive general education program for Indiana University Bl oomington.
By 2011, every baccalaureate degree offered by Indiana University Bloomington should include, as a subset of its general education requirements, provisions that embody and implement the principles and curriculum described below.
These principles and curriculum shall be the norm for a basic level of general education that will shared by all baccalaureate degrees. In most instances, schools will want to adopt stronger requirements than the basic level describe here. Although a school could adopt the specific language given below, in most instances schools will want to recast these principles and requirements in broader statements of educational philosophy and principles. School Faculties and the Bloomington Faculty, exercising their respective authority as set forth in the Constitution of the Indiana University Faculty either through their representative, elected Policy Committees and Councils or through direct referenda , may strengthen these principles and requirements by specifying additional principles and requirements, levels of courses, additional interdisciplinary content, intellectual competencies, etc. School Faculties and the Bloomington Faculty, exercising their respective authority as previously described, may modify these principles and requirements to take account their unique circumstances and licensing and accreditation requirements. However, School Faculties and the Bloomington Campus Faculty should be aware that modifications of the norm described by the principles and requirements below may penalize students who transfer from their degree programs to other IU degree programs. In formulating their requirements, School Faculties and the Bloomington Faculty should be cognizant of their responsibilities under the policies of the University Faculty Council and the Board of Trustees to strive to facilitate articulation of courses and degree requirements between campuses for the benefit of students who transfer between campuses of the University.
  1. Principles: Every IU baccalaureate degree program should require students
    1. to learn foundational concepts, knowledge, perspectives and skills in communication and in qualitative and quantitative analysis at a college-level,
    2. to learn fundamental ideas, theories, perspectives, ethics, methodologies, and applications in the arts and humanities, in the social sciences and historical and cultural studies, and in the physical and life sciences,
    3. to develop intellectual capabilities for applying knowledge in critical, reasoned analyses and judgments using empirical, normative, and logical methodologies appropriately, and
    4. to develop their writing and communication skills beyond a foundational level.
  2. Curriculum :
    1. Foundations: The following items form the foundations of knowledge and core communication and quantitative skills for a college education and should, whenever possible, be completed during the freshman year. These requirements may be fulfilled either by college-level courses or by prior learning as evidenced by scores on placement and advanced placement exams. If fulfilled by courses, the courses should be courses that either are taught on all IU campuses or have equivalents on all IU campuses.
      1. A student should be able to write coherently and properly.
        This requirement will normally and ordinarily be met through an English composition/writing class at the level of W131 or higher or a literature course that emphasizes writing; however, a school or the Campus may adopt an alternative approach.
      2. A student should be able to analyze and handle quantitative information.
        This requirement will normally and ordinarily be met through a college-level mathematics, statistics, or quantitative reasoning class that covers significant quantitative concepts and reasoning above and beyond the level of algebra.
        A course whose content significantly overlaps the Core 40 list of topics for algebra 1 and 2 and geometry is not a college-level mathematics course; responsibility for determining whether a course is college-level for this requirement shall, in accordance with the University's Master Course Inventory Policy, be vested collectively in the Mathematics Departments of the campuses of Indiana University. Whether a course is college-level depends in part upon the Bloomington campus' admission requirements; if Bloomington's admission requirement in mathematics coincides with the Core 40 minimum of two years of algebra and one year of geometry, then a course such as Math M025 might be considered to be college-level for purposes of this requirement even though it does not carry credit toward graduation. However, if Bloomington's admission requirement in mathematics includes a semester of precalculus, then a course such as Math M025 might not be considered to be college-level for the purposes of this requirement. Examples of courses that would be college-level are A118, M118, M119, K300, and higher level mathematics and statistics courses.
        A school may adopt an alternative approach, but doing so may penalize students who transfer from one degree program to another.
      3. A student should satisfy all other communication, analytical, and information literacy skill requirements specified for the student's school and degree program by the faculty of that school and degree program, respectively.
    2. Intellectual Capabilities and Breadth of Knowledge: Every IU Bloomington baccalaureate degree should require college-level courses that simultaneously develop students' intellectual capabilities and introduce students broadly to the scholarship, ideas, and methodology of one or more fields with the disciplinary breadth specified below. To be acceptable for a general education requirement in this section, a course should demonstrate through its syllabus, readings, learning outcomes, and assignments and exams that it both introduces students to fundamental ideas, theories, perspectives, methodologies, ethics and applications and moreover aims to develop their intellectual capacity for applying this knowledge in critical, reasoned, methodologically sound analyses appropriate to the discipline and subject matter. 7 Academic departments and faculty shall have the responsibility and shall be held accountable for insuring that their general education courses continuously meet this standard.
      In order to facilitate students' transferring from one campus to another, whenever possible, the accepted courses should include courses that either are taught on all IU campuses or have equivalents on all IU campuses.
      1. A student should take at least two courses in the Humanities and Arts, however this group may be described. Regardless of how this requirement is formulated, the courses should be in different departments, disciplines, or thematic areas.
      2. A student should take at least two courses in the Social and Behavioral Sciences. This grouping might be described in many ways. The courses should be in different departments, disciplines, or thematic areas.
      3. A student should take at least 5 credit hours in the Physical and Life Sciences, including, whenever possible, at least one laboratory or field experience or observational course.
      4. A student should take at least two courses that are either (i) a study of a culture other than the student's own culture or a study of the diversity within the student's own culture, (ii) a foreign language at the sophomore level or higher, or (iii) an international experience.
      5. A student should take at least one course that teaches significant applications of computer/information technology within a discipline or is a college-level computer science or informatics course.
      6. A student should take at least one course in a professional school or in a professional department within the College that provides an introduction to that profession and meets the intellectual capabilities and breadth of knowledge criteria stated above, i.e., introduces students to fundamental ideas, theories, perspectives, methodologies, ethics, and applications and develops their intellectual capacity for applying this knowledge in critical, reasoned, methodologically sound analyses appropriate to the profession. This course should be in a different school than the course used for the preceding requirement on applications of computing technology/computer science/informatics.
      7. To further strengthen the student's writing abilities, at least two of the courses used to satisfy the preceding six requirements in this section should contain significant writing components, or one of the courses should be an intensive writing experience, or the student's degree should require a capstone research writing experience in either the major or an interdisciplinary integrative course.
    Of the courses taken to satisfy requirements 2.a.i, 2.b.i, 2.b.ii, 2.b.iii, 2.b.iv(i), and 2.b.iv(ii), all or all but one should be in the College of Arts and Sciences.
  3. Other Provisions:
    1. Students should complete these requirements, except for any capstone writing experience, prior to their junior year, except in cases of personal or programmatic exigencies and in cases of international experiences.
    2. For all requirements except the Physical and Life Sciences requirement, all courses used to satisfy the requirements must count at least 3 credit hours toward the completion of a baccalaureate degree, except that courses transferred from other institutions on quarter systems as 2 credit hour courses may be used to satisfy these requirements.
    3. Only courses in which a student receives a grade of C- or better may be used to satisfy these requirements. The reason for this grade requirement is that the overall goal of this general education policy is for every Indiana University baccalaureate student (i) to learn "fundamental ideas, theories, perspectives, methodologies, ethics and applications" and (ii) to develop her/his "intellectual capacity for applying this knowledge in critical, reasoned, methodologically sound analyses appropriate to the discipline and subject matter." A student who earns less than a C- will not have achieved this goal. A school or the campus may weaken this requirement, but doing so may penalize students who transfer from one degree program to another and may undercut the school's or the campus' effort to demonstrate the efficacy of its general education program for purposes of accreditation. If a school does weaken this requirement, then it should have an alternate plan for assessing and demonstrating the efficacy of its general education program.
    4. Normally, no course should be used to satisfy two or more of these requirements, except that a course may satisfy both the writing requirement in the Intellectual Capabilities and Breadth of Knowledge section and one other requirement in that section. A school or the campus may grant exceptions to this for particular, interdisciplinary courses.
    5. Although the names used for the categories of courses are usually associated with groups of disciplines within the College of Arts and/or Sciences, this does not mean that the courses used for those requirements have to be within the College of Arts and Sciences. The courses may be in any school, but they need to meet the normal standards of those disciplinary groups. For instance, a course taught in a School of Music or School of Journalism might qualify to be an Arts and Humanities course. A course taught in the Schools of Business, Education, Public and Environmental Affairs, etc., might qualify to be a Social Science course. A course taught in a Schools of Health, Physical Education, and Recreation Physical Education, Public and Environmental Affairs, etc., might qualify as a Physical and Life Sciences course.
    6. Within a school, the elected Faculty Policy Committee shall have primary authority for resolving disagreements within the school concerning the appropriateness of courses for satisfying these requirements; if that committee is unable to resolve a disagreement, then the Dean of the school shall have authority to resolve the disagreement. For the campus, the Bloomington Faculty Council shall have primary authority for resolving disagreements between units on the campus concerning the appropriateness of courses for satisfying these requirements; however, if the Faculty Council is unable to resolve a disagreement, then the Chancellor of the campus shall have the authority to resolve the disagreement.


Footnotes:

1"Constitution of the Indiana University Faculty", sections 2.2.D, 2.2.E, 2.4.A.5, and 2.4.A.6.
2op. cite, sections 2.2.D and preamble of 2.4.
3Although the date of passage of this policy is asserted in the Bloomington Academic Guide and on the BFC web site to be March 3, 1981, the actual date must be otherwise, because it does not appear in the BFC minutes for that date.
4Robert Eno, Chair, BFC EPC, Oct. 9, 2001, memo to EPC.
5loc. cit.
6 http://www.fas.harvard.edu/curriculum-review/
7Because each course used for requirements in this section must demonstrably both introduce "students to fundamental ideas, theories, perspectives, methodologies, ethics and applications" and aim "to develop their intellectual capacity for applying this knowledge in critical, reasoned, methodologically sound analyses appropriate to the discipline and subject matter", prior learning as evidenced by placement and advanced placement exams will not normally satisfy the requirements in this section. However, if a student earns credit with a grade of C- or better by transfer or by examination for a course that would otherwise satisfy a requirement in this section, then the credit by transfer or examination will suffice to satisfy the requirement.